


Against All Odds

by EvvieJo



Category: Torchwood
Genre: AU, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-29
Updated: 2013-12-29
Packaged: 2018-01-06 14:41:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1108055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EvvieJo/pseuds/EvvieJo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ianto Jones leads a boring life, working at a Cardiff café. Until he becomes fascinated with a regular customer in an RAF greatcoat.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Against All Odds

**Author's Note:**

> Ianto never went to London and never worked for Torchwood One. The rest stays more or less the same, and this would fit into the timeline somewhere between Meat and Reset.  
> If there is anything that anyone might find familiar, it's either because it's canon or because great minds think alike ('cause having been in the fandom for just a couple of months and being a rather busy person, I haven't had the chance to read a lot of Janto fanfiction, so I don't know what has already been done).  
> Enjoy.

The guy in a military-style coat started showing up at the café suddenly and without warning. One day he simply came in and hadn't ceased coming in since. Every day. 

The hours weren't fixed, but there hadn't been a period of twenty four hours that failed to witness him at the tiny table by the window. And Ianto was counting. Twenty three hours and forty eight minutes was the longest. He didn't even know why that guy was so fascinating to him. Sure, he was attractive, ridiculously so, but then again, Ianto couldn't recall ever looking at another man and his first thought being, 'God, he's bloody gorgeous.' But with the guy in the greatcoat, he couldn't help but think that every single time his figure blocked out the light in the café’s door. The fact that the man was constantly flirting didn't help much either. Every time he sent Ianto the most charming of the world's smiles or told him some petty little compliment (about how the red of his uniform was definitely his colour et cetera), the barista felt like a schoolgirl whose crush acknowledged her existence; that was simply embarrassing. But then, whenever it was someone else on the receiving end of the coat guy’s niceties, Ianto felt just the tiniest bit cheated.

It had been weeks since the man's first appearance and Ianto had spent a lot of his time (as much as he could without it affecting his performance at work or raising suspicion) watching him, wondering who in hell he might be. Ianto sometimes amused himself with outlandish theories such as thinking that he was an actual World War II soldier who was accidentally transported in time to early twenty first century Cardiff. But there was an air of timelessness and the kind of wisdom that comes with age around him. Despite the flirtiness and that wide flashy grin, his eyes seemed to have a strange depth to them, as if they'd seen much more than someone in their late thirties (as Ianto assumed that was the mystery man's age) could possibly have witnessed.

That day, the man showed up late in the afternoon and ordered his usual double espresso. He sipped it languidly, staring out the window, as was his habit, and Ianto was sure the coffee had long run cold. But the mystery guy didn’t seem to mind that. He did seem to be bored, annoyed and disappointed, and soon began to check his watch every other minute. The street outside appeared to have lost his appeal as he glanced at a PDA he retrieved from his greatcoat pocket.

The business was getting slow as darkness fell, and Ianto could steal a few long glances in the man’s direction. He was only getting more intrigued, more and more dazed by those strangely deep blue eyes and the smile that sometimes felt like a façade.

Ianto was just making his way to wipe the empty tables in the centre of the room, when a young dark-haired woman entered the café hurriedly, directing her steps to the man in the coat. That was a first. No one had ever accompanied or met him there before. Ianto focused on listening and trying to look inconspicuous and disinterested.

‘Jack!,’ the woman said, drawing the man’s attention and forcing it away from Ianto’s backside (which Ianto found he was disappointed about; the weight of Jack’s – he made a mental note of the name – eyes on his bottom was strangely flattering). ‘The activity ended. No luck?’

‘Nah,’ Jack answered, a corner of his mouth twitching up as his eyes flicked momentarily back to Ianto. ‘None whatsoever.’

Ianto could feel a blush creeping onto his face and he made sure to face away from the two people by the window.

The woman dropped heavily onto the chair opposite Jack, eyeing him from under squinted lids.

‘Don’t you think it’s rather pointless to come out here all the time? The pattern’s the same, we get a spike and nothing happens. You really don’t have to come here only to get some bad coffee and wait for hours on end for Weevils that won’t show up.’

Ianto furrowed his brows at the odd word. What could possibly anything have to do with insects? And what kind of activity did she mean? He turned his head back towards the pair despite himself. Jack flashed him his dazzling smile before answering – and before Ianto remembered himself and looked away again.

‘One, we don’t know for sure it’s Weevils. Two, they _may_ show up in the end. And three,’ he gave her a critical look, ‘the coffee here is great. Isn’t it, Ianto?’

Ianto flinched. He’d been caught eavesdropping, but what really made his heart race was that Jack apparently remembered his name from the silver name tag he wore on his chest.

‘Uh, yes, actually, it’s the best in Cardiff,’ he stammered. His cheeks were burning; he couldn’t remember feeling as daft in years.

‘It’s ‘cause you don’t scorch the beans, right, Ianto?’ Another brilliant white smile.

‘Yeah, that’s right.’

The woman groaned, covering her face with her hands.

‘Jack, do you ever stop?’

‘Stop what, Gwen?’

She shot him a dubious look. ‘You know what. You’re making the poor lad uncomfortable,’ she said in a hushed voice, but not low enough for Ianto not to catch it.

‘Oh, Ianto doesn’t mind, do you, Ianto?’

Trying to seem unaffected and completely calm, Ianto looked back at them.

‘Course not.’ He smiled politely.

‘See?’ Jack grinned proudly at Gwen, who rolled her eyes at him.

‘Sorry for him, he thinks he can charm the pants off anybody.’ Gwen looked apologetically at Ianto and got up, waving at Jack to follow her. ‘Come on, you pervert.’

Jack stood up, mimicking her affectionately and winking at Ianto. ‘You can’t say I’m wrong in thinking that, though.’

They crossed the threshold, letting the door close behind them by itself.

‘You are one sick bastard, Jack Harkness,’ were the last words that Ianto caught.

‘Jack Harkness,’ he repeated to himself in a whisper.

***

Ianto seemed to be catching himself on being entirely unable to control his mind more and more often. His thoughts kept on wandering off in the direction of the mysterious Jack Harkness. At least now he had a name, there was no more speculation or doubt about that. He still had no idea about who Jack Harkness was, what he did for a living, where he came from (apart from the accent-based guess that he was American), and what exactly it was he was doing, watching the bloody street through the cafe window.

Another question that was left unanswered was what exactly it was that made Ianto so intrigued.

There were plenty of customers he saw regularly at the café. There were lots of people he found interesting when he passed them in the street . But he never thought about them twice. They were just people, with their petty ordinary lives and nothing remarkable about them. Just like there was nothing remarkable about Ianto.

And just like Jack was anything but unremarkable.

With the look of a Hollywood star playing a forties fighter pilot, and the high tech equipment he sometimes would take out at the café, he was the definition of intriguing. The way he flirted with just about anyone, regardless of skin colour, age or sex was just another of many unique things about him. And it seemed Jack liked to keep the mystery surrounding him.

That frustrated Ianto even more than how obsessed he was becoming with Mr Harkness.

***

Jack Harkness followed Gwen Cooper to the place where she had left her car, smiling unconsciously as his mind wandered off to the little café and the young barista. The hours he’d spent waiting for any kind of Rift-related event should have seemed to him a tremendous waste, but he found he hardly could regret all that time, despite his annoyance and disappointment.

In his long life, Jack had met a lot of people he’d liked, loved, shagged or flirted with. He found almost everyone attractive in their own unique way, but he’d learnt to be careful with where he put his affections. When you lived forever, pain wasn’t hard to come by, so Jack was determined to not get attached if he could only help it.

And he failed way too often for his own good.

This time though, it was different. It wasn’t that he got _attached_ or that he fell in love. He hardly could say he knew the pretty boy behind the café’s counter. He didn’t even know his last name. But there was a twinkle in Ianto’s eye that made him stand out amongst the other baristas of the world. There was an intelligence behind it, a curiosity and an underlying boldness. Jack would sometimes find himself listening in on the conversations between the employees at the café and having to stifle a laugh at one of Ianto’s snarky remarks. And even though at first Jack assumed Ianto was wasting his time in such a dead-end job, he noticed that the boy clearly liked what he was doing.

But Jack still wondered if his instinct about Ianto was right, if there really was something more to the quiet barista with his Welsh vowels and the twinkle in his eye.

***

Ianto knew he was being creepy. He also knew that it was a stupid, stupid thing to do and a long shot. An enigmatic guy like Jack Harkness would probably be able to tell he was being followed. He could be a spy or an undercover cop for all Ianto knew.

But the opportunity was one in a million. Jack Harkness had just made a move towards the door when Ianto’s shift ended and he ran out after him, pulling his jacket on on the way. It was drizzling, and the cold droplets clung to Ianto’s face, making him shiver. He made out the outline of Jack’s body in the far end of the street, turning the corner briskly. He picked up his pace.

Ianto had expected Jack to go to a parked car somewhere in the close vicinity of the café, but the man showed no intention of getting into any of the vehicles he passed. He went on and on, down the dark damp streets of early autumn evening Cardiff. Ianto kept close enough to not lose sight of him, but far enough to not be recognised in case Jack looked over his shoulder. They were heading towards the Millennium Centre and it crossed Ianto’s mind that maybe Jack had plans around there. But when they reached the Plass, Jack went straight to the Water Tower and, in a blink of an eye, he vanished.

It took Ianto aback. It was entirely, undeniably impossible to explain in terms other than supernatural. One second Jack was walking through the Roald Dahl Plass towards the Water Tower, perfectly visible, solid and tangible, the next – he was gone.

Stupidly, Ianto looked around, as if he expected Jack to appear behind him out of thin air. But no matter which way he looked, Jack was nowhere to be seen. Not by the Water Tower, not by the Millennium Centre, not anywhere around the vast Plass, not anywhere along Bute Crescent or Bute Place. Like he fell through the ground and out of sight.

Ianto was beginning to think he’d made up this whole chase in his head; maybe even Jack Harkness himself was no more than a figment of his all-too-vivid, bored-to-death imagination. He probably should have left that bloody job a long time ago. Rhiannon was right; his brain was too well developed for making coffee for a living.

But right now it didn’t matter. Even if he was going crazy and even if he should be quitting his job at the café, it could all wait till morning and he still had the evening off.

He had to clear his head, so he strolled slowly through the Plass towards Mermaid Quay. Nothing as good for cleansing your thoughts of stupid, made-up man crushes as the cool breeze from over the Bay.

He thought he really had to be going mad. What was going on with him? Obsessing over some bloke who came to his coffee shop every day? That was like a story from a cheap romantic comedy. One with a budget too low to even start dreaming of getting Hugh Grant to play the lead. Or even to get a cameo.

It didn’t really bother him that it was a _man_ he was so obviously crushing on, even though, sure, he’d never had boyfriends. He’d never been seriously interested in a man, either. But he was open to the possibility. His father would be appalled had he ever found out his son didn’t rule out having sex with a man as an option, but now the old man was dead and buried, and Ianto didn’t intend to let him hold him back from beyond the grave.

Though, obviously, there was nothing to hold Ianto back from, as apparently Jack Harkness didn’t even bloody exist.

And just as he was thinking that, a familiar figure appeared in his peripheral vision by an inconspicuous door to a closed Tourist Information Centre down on Mermaid Quay.

‘I guess it’s a good thing you don’t work for MI6, ‘cause they’d fire your ass for this sort of tailing skills,’ Jack said, one corner of his mouth pulling up.

‘Do _you_? Work for MI6, I mean. Or CIA, whatever,’ Ianto stuttered in response. He felt silly, even if Jack wasn’t a hallucination after all.

Jack chuckled, taking a slow, watchful step towards the younger man.

‘No. I’m not a spy. I’m too much of a free spirit to be held back by an organisation like that.’ He laughed again, as if there was something funny in what he said. ‘Why were you following me?’ His expression turned solemn, his usual grin gone.

Ianto shrugged. Was there even an answer to that question? Apart from, “I’m oddly attracted to you, even though all my life I thought I was straight?” He honestly couldn’t come up with anything else that would be one hundred per cent true.

‘I just happened to be walking this way. I like the Quay at night,’ he lied as smoothly as he could.

Jack tutted.

‘And that’s why at one point you started looking around the Plass like a lost puppy? Ianto, Ianto. You really should come up with a more convincing lie. Especially when you’re talking to me.’

A sigh escaped Ianto’s lips as he rolled his eyes.

‘And why exactly is that so? Why _are_ you so special?’ The words sounded more harshly than he’d intended.

‘I’ve been around for quite some time, makes it easier to spot a liar.’ Jack shrugged his shoulders. It seemed he was now much closer to Ianto than either of them had realised, and their breaths hitched in their throats at the same moment.

Ianto steeled himself and looked straight into Jack’s ice blue eyes. They were roughly the same height, and with the little distance between them, keeping his eyes away from Ianto’s was a difficult task, so Jack gave up on even trying.

‘How do you even know about that? That... Plass thing?,’ Ianto managed to ask. Despite the cold, he felt like he was burning up.

‘I have my sources.’

Ianto quirked an eyebrow. ‘Really? That could imply intelligence. How did you disappear, though?’

Jack bit his lip, deep in thought for a moment. Trusting people to keep Torchwood’s secrets was risky business. Having to keep an eye on Rhys Williams and Idris Hopper was a lot already, and now he was faced with deciding whether or not he could trust some random coffee boy with some of the most dangerous stuff on Earth. What the hell was happening to him if he was considering it even for a second? Only after a moment he reminded himself of the easy solution that was Retcon, but he pushed the thought away. Why? They’d given the bloody pill to thousands of people. One more partly amnesiac barista wouldn’t make a difference.

But maybe Gwen was right. Maybe they needed someone to talk about all of that to. Maybe the years of keeping all his lovers at a distance were finally taking a toll on him. Maybe it had been too long staying away from a real relationship.

Only what in hell made him think this pretty boy with the twinkle in his eye could be that for him?

He still didn’t know when he answered.

‘Wanna see?’

***

They crossed the distance back to the Water Tower in silence, walking side by side, close enough to feel the heat rolling off of each other’s body in the autumn chill, but not close enough to let their shoulders brush against each other. Jack kept on sneaking sideways glances at Ianto, who stared ahead with steel determination.

Jack smirked at that.

They arrived at the Water Tower and Jack stopped suddenly. Ianto raised his eyebrows queryingly. Nothing happened. No one disappeared. What exactly was Jack supposed to be showing him?

‘A little patience, Ianto,’ Jack said with a charming grin, presenting him with his arm.

Ianto hooked his arm on Jack’s, despite the fact that he had no idea what was going on. Whatever was going to happen, at least he didn’t have that much to lose. Except maybe his dignity if it was some really silly joke. Or his life if Jack was dangerous. He sighed at his stupidity.

Before Ianto finished wondering what was going to happen to him, Jack lifted his left hand and opened the wrist strap he was always wearing on it. He pressed a couple of buttons and flashed his teeth in a cheeky smile.

‘E voila!’

The pavement beneath them moved. Like the slab they were standing on was loose. Only that it didn’t wobble. It just _moved_. Down.

Ianto looked at the ground and saw they were literally going through the ground below on a piece of pavement. And no one of the passing people seemed to notice.

‘Okay, why is nobody bothered by the huge gap in the pavement? Haven’t they ever been told to mind the gap?,’ he asked.

Jack chuckled.

‘I bet they were, they just can’t really see this one.’

The space between the slab (which now seemed much smaller than when it was surrounded by other slabs, fixed firmly in the ground) and the pavement that was running up and away from their feet began to be illuminated by a bluish light from below. Soon, Ianto was able to make out shapes of railings and metal walkways, computer work stations and various strange equipment. As well as a room that looked a lot like an armoury.

‘Welcome to Torchwood, Ianto,’ Jack said when the pavement lift came to a halt at the foot of what seemed to be the bottom end of the Water Tower and they stepped off. ‘It would sound better if I knew your last name, but I never found that out. I don’t stalk people if I can help it.’

‘Jones. Ianto Jones.’ He decided to leave the rest without a comment.

‘Then welcome to Torchwood, Ianto Jones.’

Ianto turned back to face Jack.

‘Cool. Fine.’ He paused. ‘What _is_ Torchwood exactly, though?’

Jack waved his hands at the vast space around them. It seemed even bigger now when Ianto could look around freely without fearing falling to his death.

‘This is Torchwood.’

‘Uh, yeah, I figured that out,’ Ianto said. ‘And there it says that, too.’ He pointed to the old train station name on one on the far walls. ‘I mean, it’s an organisation of sorts, I assume. Clandestine. But you’re not a spy. It’s something else. So judging by the weirdness, the lift, that wrist strap and all that, I’m guessing you deal with some pretty strange stuff. Like aliens or whatever.’

Jack’s jaw dropped. Sure, Ianto did give the impression of being intelligent, but how exactly did he come up with the _alien_ part of it all?

‘What?’

‘You said aliens,’ Jack replied. ‘Why did you say aliens?’

‘Well, it’s not like they haven’t paid us a visit.’ When Jack frowned, he rolled his eyes and added, ‘London, Christmas Day 2005? And earlier, that spaceship on the Thames? Honestly, I wouldn’t have expected _Cardiff_ to have a clandestine organisation dealing with aliens, but I wouldn’t entirely discount the existence of such at all.’

‘Now, that’s what I call impressive,’ Jack choked out. ‘Ianto Jones, you are a man full of surprises.’

Ianto eyed him doubtfully.

‘Says the guy who disappears in the ground and looks like he was taken straight out of _Pearl Harbor_.’

After a pout and a moment of thought, Jack caved. ‘Fair point. But this kinda is a first. Not to mention I usually don’t bring stray coffee boys back home on the first date.’ He grinned.

‘But you do otherwise?,’ Ianto said, squinting his eyes. ‘And since when is this a date? I thought I was being a creepy stalker who got caught.’

‘Yeah, but you were a _cute_ stalker, too, so I guess we’re fine on the stalking front.’ Jack stepped a little closer to Ianto, just enough to make him tense. ‘And you’re right, this is so not a date. You didn’t ask me out. I didn’t ask you either. This needs to be fixed.’

There was no way of knowing if Jack was implying what Ianto thought he was implying, but he didn’t really have much control over his tongue at the moment.

‘Will you go out with me?’

For a second Ianto couldn’t tell if the smile that spread across Jack’s face was mocking or excited.

‘Are you sure you can handle this level of perfection?,’ Jack asked, teasing, and leant so that his lips were a mere inch away from Ianto’s.

Ianto could feel Jack’s breath on his mouth. He thought his heart would jump out of his chest any second.

‘I can try,’ he mumbled. ‘I’m quite flawless myself, if you haven’t noticed.’

Jack laughed. ‘God, I could kiss you right now.’

‘Then do it.’

Before Ianto could properly finish the sentence, there were lips on his lips. Expert, soft, hasty and absolutely delicious. He’d thought about how different kissing a man could be from kissing a woman, but it was largely the same thing. Only, god, he’d never been kissed _this_ well by anyone.

‘Bloody hell,’ Ianto gasped the moment Jack pulled away.

‘I’ll take that as a compliment.’ The large cocky grin was back on Jack’s face. ‘You weren’t bad yourself, Ianto Jones. And with me saying this... well, it’s saying something about your skills.’

Ianto rolled his eyes prominently, and moved away from Jack, stepping further into the Hub. What he figured was the working area was lit up by numerous screens, flickering with some curious readings and data. Under the Torchwood train station sign was an old sofa and a table, littered with old pizza boxes and papers. Off to the right, Ianto could see steps leading to a circular room that looked much like a morgue.

‘This is... cosy,’ he said dubiously, looking back at Jack. ‘Wait, you said you don’t bring- people back _home_ on the first date. Don’t tell me you’re a vampire and you sleep in one of those corpse cupboards down there.’ He pointed towards the small metal doors in the autopsy area. ‘I probably couldn’t stomach that.’

With a serious expression on his face, Jack walked slowly up to Ianto, until they were face to face again.

‘No. I’m not a vampire. And I don’t really sleep.’

‘Are you an alien, then?’ Ianto hated how ridiculous the question sounded.

‘No. Not the way you mean it.’

They held each other’s gaze for a moment, their minds wandering off in various directions. Jack couldn’t stop musing why he was still there, leading that poor lad on, not taking out the Retcon, spilling his secrets like rainwater. At the same time Ianto was working hard to contain his nerves and hoping Jack couldn’t see him trembling.

‘In what way then?,’ he asked finally.

‘Would you believe me if I told you I used to be a time traveller?’

Ianto squinted, pretending to think this through. ‘Aliens, sure, I could buy that, but time travel? Nah, I wouldn’t.’ He expected Jack to grin again, but his face stayed solemn. ‘Seriously?’

‘Yeah.’

A shadow crossed Jack’s eyes and he moved past Ianto towards his office, shrugging off his greatcoat on the way. Tentatively, the younger man followed; his belief that he was going barking mad was growing stronger, but at the same time, everything felt so real, so logical, so completely unsurprising in all its strangeness. Ianto had known from the beginning there was something unusual about Jack Harkness. Now he was just getting a confirmation.

Jack stopped and was standing with his back to Ianto as he began speaking again.

‘I was born in the fifty-first century. Far away, you wouldn’t even know where it was if I told you the name of the place.’ He paused, waiting for Ianto to interrupt; it didn’t happen. He turned back to him. ‘Anyway, that doesn’t really matter.’

‘Then why are you telling me that?’

Ianto was leaning on the doorframe, watching him carefully. His fascination was ceaseless.

‘It’s nice to talk to someone once in a while, don’t you think?,’ Jack said nonchalantly.

‘Wouldn’t know. I’m not much of a talker.’ Ianto bit his lip as he put together his thoughts. ‘So you’re from the future,’ he stated finally.

‘Yup.’

It was a shocking piece of information, and it took Ianto a long moment to take it in properly. Slowly, he stepped in Jack’s direction, exhaling a long breath.

‘So- I guess one could say you’re special.’

Jack laughed bitterly. ‘Guess so.’ He looked him in the eye, keeping up a cheery façade. ‘Wanna know another secret?’

‘Do you ever run out of them?’

The mood was getting heavier by the minute, Ianto could sense it, despite Jack’s efforts to keep it light. They seemed to agree wordlessly on that. No need for drama.

‘Nah, life is boring without some of those.’ Jack tried to keep the corners of his mouth turned up, but failed. ‘I can’t die.’

Ianto’s eyebrows shot up in surprise before he could control the reaction. ‘As in- you can’t die- ever?’

‘Not ever.’

‘What if you got blown up, into a million pieces?’

Jack shrugged dismissively.

‘Never tried that, but- I guess I’d just put myself together somehow.’ He shuddered despite himself, before adding, ‘I’d rather not find out how, though.’

They fell silent for a moment. It wasn’t exactly awkward; it was just that some things are better left without a comment. Some things just don’t need any.

Ianto used the time to take a look around the office. A desk. Some monitors, papers, strange objects. Everything fitting perfectly with the overall feel of an underground base of a clandestine organisation. He thought the whole place needed some cleaning, but he guessed Torchwood wasn’t the kind of workplace to have an employee whose duties would include dusting or scrubbing floors.

‘So... You took me down here to talk? Or...?’ Ianto’s voice grew quiet, until it faded entirely.

Jack had been watching him for the long moment of his inspecting the room, still puzzled and torn about what he was doing. There was a reason why he never did this anymore. He’d been to too many funerals. He’d seen too many loved ones slip away from his grasp and into death or unfamiliarity. Dragging Ianto into the bloody – often literally – mess that was his life, was probably the most selfish, the most cruel thing he’d ever done in his life. And he’d made his share of hurtful mistakes and tough decisions. On top of that, his reasoning for doing this was as far from logical as could be; it just felt weirdly _right_ , despite its complete wrongness. Jack simply had an unshakeable feeling that Ianto would _understand_.

Maybe it was the years of living among humans on Earth that lead Jack to think he could figure people out. Or maybe he was delusional.

Or bloody desperate.

But the loneliness _was_ weighing down on his shoulders. Oppressive. Obviously, he had Gwen, Owen, Tosh. He could tell them things, but he never did. There were things he thought they wouldn’t be able to handle. Flat Holm for instance. He couldn’t imagine how Gwen would ever cope with that. And keeping it all to himself, bottling up all the emotions was just too damn tiring sometimes.

The thought of slipping Ianto Retcon was still there, lurking on the edge of his mind. He pushed it away, time and time again. He wouldn’t do it, if he could help it.

And, again insanely, he thought he could trust Ianto to keep his secrets.

‘I wanted to talk, but there are so many more things we could do,’ Jack said finally, a tiny mischievous smile appearing on his face.

Ianto didn’t really know what he was doing. Throwing caution to the wind and hoping that trusting his instincts wouldn’t lead him to too much embarrassment, he crossed the short distance between him and Jack, kissing him and reaching to unbutton the other man’s shirt.

***

At first, they didn’t even make it to Jack’s bunker below his office. Neither of them would admit it to the other, but they both thought that they’d wanted this ever since they first saw each other in the café. Ianto thought Jack must have had more experience than a retired porn star, and every touch of his fingertips was deliberate and thrilling, sending shivers down Ianto’s spine. That was the most amazing sex of Ianto’s life, every other moment of intimacy in his memory paling in comparison.

He tried to match up to Jack, and in his mind he was failing miserably at that. But when they finally made it to Jack’s bed (both worn out, sweaty and sticky), the captain made sure to tell him he’d done better than ninety per cent of people he’d been with. Ianto blushed at that, and Jack smiled, utterly in love with the somewhat shy side of him. There was something in that boy that made him swoon just a little, even though he couldn’t pinpoint what exactly. And normally, he didn’t swoon. He flirted, he shagged. Sometimes, he fell in love. Swooning was something else.

Eventually, Ianto dozed off, an arm draped over Jack’s chest.

Jack never removed his eyes from him, torn between post-sex bliss and his never-ending doubts.

***

When Ianto opened his eyes, he immediately remembered what had happened before. The feeling of sheets tangled around his naked body (which was in desperate need of a shower) were as much of a giveaway as the pair of ice blue eyes staring back at him.

‘Good morning,’ Jack said.

‘Morning,’ Ianto mumbled awkwardly. He felt embarrassed about the state he was in, even though Jack was the one responsible for it. ‘What time is it?’

‘Almost six.’

Ianto frowned.

‘And you spent all this time staring?’

‘No,’ Jack chuckled. ‘Most of the time, though, yes.’

‘You’d be creepy, if you weren’t so good-looking. Or rather, I can forgive you for being creepy because of your good looks.’ He propped himself up on his elbow, so that his eyes were level with Jack’s. ‘And I guess I should’ve played hard to get, make it more interesting for you.’

With another laugh, Jack flopped back onto the sheets, breaking the eye contact in an attempt to hide the thoughts that were troubling him from Ianto. But then he suddenly turned serious for another reason.

‘You’re interesting enough for me, Ianto Jones.’

‘How about that date, then?,’ Ianto asked, leaning over Jack and running his fingers down the other man’s chest, stomach, slowing down right below his navel.

Jack groaned in frustration.

‘I’ll say yes if your hand doesn’t stop where it just did.’

It didn’t stop.

***

It was strange to hang around the Hub – as Jack was calling the base – after they got dressed. Any minute now, the other Torchwood employees could emerge from the circular door leading (again, as Jack said) from the entrance on Mermaid Quay, disguised as the defunct Tourist Information Centre. Ianto could even recall having seen the shabby door down at the quay before the previous night, bearing the sign of the centre, but had never given much thought to why it wasn’t open.

While Jack went to the monitors to check if he hadn’t missed any Rift activity, Ianto wandered around the workspace, absent-mindedly gathering the papers and empty pizza boxes littering all kinds of flat surfaces.

Jack gave him an indulgent smile.

‘You could’ve told me you’re obsessive-compulsive,’ he said.

‘I just like order.’ Ianto shrugged, feeling his cheeks burn. And he would’ve thought having someone else’s penis up his arse would make him less prone to getting embarrassed over such details.

Neither managed to say anything more, as the door slid aside, revealing a young, brown-haired man who stopped in his tracks, eyeing Ianto.

‘Did we get a cleaning crew in here and I missed the memo?,’ he asked in a heavy London accent.

‘No,’ Jack said firmly, rolling his eyes. ‘Owen, this is Ianto Jones. Ianto, Owen Harper.’

‘ _Doctor_ Owen Harper.’ He extended a hand towards Ianto, his eyes still little more than small suspicious slits.

‘Pleasure,’ Ianto said as confidently as he could, shaking the doctor’s hand.

Owen turned to his boss with a questioning look.

‘I thought we didn’t have vacancies? Or did Tosh go all Suzie on you? I’d guess Gwen wouldn’t...’

‘Ianto’s here for- personal reasons,’ Jack told him.

Owen’s eyebrows shot up as far up his forehead as they could go.

‘Personal reasons?,’ he asked incredulously. ‘You mean you shagged him _in the bloody Hub_? You didn’t want to let Gwen tell her fiancé what she does for a living, but you get some _random bloke_ down here for a shag? Have you already slipped him the Retcon?’

Jack was furious, but he tried to contain it. He crossed his arms over his chest and bit his lip. The silence that followed Owen’s words rang around the Hub. He couldn’t see Ianto’s expression, but he could bet the poor boy was uncomfortable and probably quite disorientated.

‘No,’ he replied at last, articulating every sound carefully. ‘And I’m not planning to.’

‘Why? If any of us let anything _slip_ to anyone, you’d make us Retcon them, but that somehow doesn’t apply to you?’

‘It doesn’t apply to Ianto,’ Jack said quietly, before turning back to his companion of the previous night. ‘C’mon, I’ll drive you home.’

Without another word, they made their way to the lift. When they were halfway up, two women entered the Hub through the circular door and gave them a curious look. The one from the other day at the café – Gwen – seemed to open her mouth to speak as she recognised the man accompanying Jack on the pavement slab. Even if she said anything, Ianto couldn’t hear her anyway.

***

They didn’t speak at all until they were sat in the tank-like, technology-packed Torchwood SUV. Jack put his hands on the wheel and turned to Ianto.

‘Sorry for Owen. The job can be stressful.’

Ianto nodded slowly with understanding. There was one thing, though, that he couldn’t stop himself from asking about.

‘What’s Retcon?’

Jack sighed, gripping the steering wheel tighter with his fingers.

‘It’s an amnesia pill.’ He studied Ianto’s expression as the younger man took it in.

‘And you give it to people who find out about you.’ It was a statement.

‘Yes.’

‘Were you going to give it to me?’

There was no hesitation. ‘No.’

Ianto looked Jack straight in the eye.

‘Why? I found out. Well, you told me. I qualify. Why wouldn’t you want to give it to me?’

‘Because we were supposed to go out on a date, remember? I don’t want to be stood up,’ Jack said nonchalantly, but his attempt at a grin was pitiful.

It seemed like Ianto wasn’t going to get a better answer, so he just mumbled an ‘okay’ and gave Jack his address.

They didn’t talk on the short way back to his flat in Grangetown. Ianto wanted to break the silence, but couldn’t think of anything to say. Jack was only glancing at him from time to time, keeping his mouth shut and trying not to think how huge a mistake he was making.

To Ianto’s surprise, Jack got out of the SUV and walked him to the front door, digging his hands in the pockets of his greatcoat, clearly nervous.

‘So... That date’s still a thing?,’ he asked. ‘Despite the whole Retcon thing?’

‘Yeah. Yeah. Why wouldn’t it be?’

Jack shrugged his shoulders, his eyes wandering away from Ianto’s face.

‘You could’ve thought I was lying about that.’

‘I didn’t.’

‘That’s- good.’ He smiled weakly. Not that huge flashy grin. Just a tiny upward twitch of the corners of the lips. ‘Pick you up from work tonight?’

Ianto nodded sharply.

‘That’ll be fine. I’m off at six.’

‘Great.’

‘See you then.’

They fell silent, but neither made a move to leave. They just kept looking at each other, awkward like bloody teenagers. Ianto felt he was blushing again. He cursed internally.

He was just about to take a step towards the door and say his goodbyes to Jack, when the captain gave in to a temptation he’d been battling for the last minute, and pulled Ianto in for a long tender kiss.

‘See you at six, then, Ianto Jones,’ he said, before leaving him blissfully stunned on the pavement and driving off.

***

Ianto had expected his mind would be reeling from all the things he’d learnt the night before, but that wasn’t the case. What kept him preoccupied throughout his work day was Jack. His thoughts were full of the memory of the man’s hands on his body, his lips everywhere, those blue eyes that were ice and fire at the same time. Ianto was completely worn out from the passionate sex they had, but he didn’t really mind that. The previous night went beyond anything he could ever imagine.

With every passing hour, he grew more impatient. By five, he found himself checking the time almost every other minute, unable to hold his excitement and anxiety.

‘What is it with you today?,’ asked him Katie, another barista working the shift with him. ‘You look like a fourteen year old before a first date.’

Ianto made a surprised face. He hadn’t even fully realised his emotions were showing.

‘Well, I’m not exactly fourteen,’ he mumbled, turning to the coffee grinder to hide his blush.

‘Ooh,’ Katie crooned in reply, earning a prominent eyeroll from her colleague. ‘Who’s the lucky girl?’

She was annoying. The kind of nosy girl to pry on the sex life of everyone she worked with. And there were few things Ianto valued more than his privacy.

‘Well, _that_ is not exactly your business,’ he answered, giving her a wide fake smile. Then he hesitated. Sure, he wanted to keep his life outside of the café to himself, but he couldn’t possibly avoid being seen with Jack if he was going to pick him up from work, could he? ‘And _she_ ’s not exactly a she.’

Katie’s jaw dropped and it was her turn to feel embarrassed.

‘Oh, I’m sorry I didn’t know you were- you know, that you played for the other team.’

It took Ianto exactly ten seconds to regret ever giving her a reply.

‘That’s because I don’t exactly play for _any_ team. It’s not rugby.’

That left her speechless for the next half hour, though Ianto could see she was uneasy with the silence and he knew there was a _look-I-really-dig-the-gays_ speech coming. It was only a quarter till he was off and he prayed for it to pass quicker.

‘Ianto?,’ she started finally, and he closed his eyes and counted to ten to keep his cool. ‘Sorry for being nosy, I just get excited with these things... You know, see, love makes me all happy, and I’m happy for you. Is he handsome?’ She made sweet innocent eyes at him.

He quirked an eyebrow at her. Now she wanted to be BFFs and he didn’t think he could handle it.

Fortunately, at the same moment, the door to the café opened with a tiny creak and Ianto’s head snapped around to see the familiar figure in a greatcoat.

‘Judge for yourself,’ he sighed, engrossed by the wide, dimply smile Jack was giving him from the entrance.

‘You gotta be kidding me,’ Katie choked out as Captain Harkness made his way gracefully between the tightly packed tables. She composed herself just in time to greet him in the politest, most customer-friendly way possible. ‘What can I get you, sir?’

‘One hot Ianto Jones, please. Stat.’ His grin grew wider and he winked at her.

Ianto couldn’t say he liked that. The wink part. The rest was incredibly flattering and his ears burnt. He felt Jack’s eyes appraising him, and it made him feel a little more awkward.

‘I’m finishing in fifteen minutes,’ he told his... date. ‘Can you wait?’

‘Only if you get me that amazing coffee of yours to keep me company while I wait.’

‘Coming right up, sir,’ Ianto said, keeping it professional.

Jack moved to the other end of the counter, watching Ianto work his coffee magic. That uniform was fitting him nicely, but Jack decided he preferred seeing Ianto without it.

‘Sir? Last night it was “God”, I liked that better.’

Ianto glared at him. ‘I’m at work? Thirteen more minutes? A little bit of professionalism and a line between private life and work doesn’t hurt, you know.’

‘Okay,’ Jack said with a pout and took the coffee Ianto was already handing him. ‘Thirteen minutes.’

‘Don’t have a stopwatch on me to count that. And I still have to change out of this.’ He pointed on his red shirt with the café’s logo.

‘I’ll watch the time for you.’

Before Ianto knew it, Katie was pushing him away from the counter and into the staff-only area.

‘Go, change, I’ll take care of everything.’

‘But I still have-‘

‘No. I wouldn’t forgive myself if you lost your chance with that bloke over a few minutes of making coffee. He’s bloody gorgeous.’

‘I know.’ He stopped for a second, one more time caught by surprise that this was going on. ‘Thanks.’

And he went to the locker room to take off the uniform and put on the suit, shirt and tie he picked with the thought of his date in mind. Now he wasn’t quite sure it was a good choice, seeing that Jack was wearing his usual WWII-style outfit.

But it was too late to change his mind about it now anyway. He sighed and flattened his hair, fixed his already perfectly knotted tie and left the locker room.

As soon as he was back out in the café, he knew he didn’t make a mistake. Jack turned his head towards him and the cup he was raising to his lips stopped halfway. The blue eyes slid from Ianto’s face to his feet and up again. Without bothering to finish his coffee, Jack put the cup down and stood up.

‘Like the suit,’ he said, still clearly impressed, but a small smile began to tug at the corners of his mouth again.

‘Like the coat,’ Ianto replied. ‘Shall we?’

***

Ianto didn’t expect Jack to come in the SUV, but he didn’t argue when the other man opened the passenger door for him. He’d planned going to a quiet restaurant in town for dinner and then, maybe back to his for a repeat of the previous night. (He even made the effort to run out to stock up on lube and condoms before he left for work.) But Jack clearly had other plans.

‘You trust me?’

‘Should I?,’ Ianto asked.

‘Probably not, but this isn’t anything dangerous, so you can.’

With a shrug, Ianto waved his hand, telling Jack to go ahead. The captain turned the key in the ignition with a grin.

They hardly spoke as they drove through the city. The evening was nice, the sky was almost completely clear, save for a few stretched out clouds over the setting sun. They went further inland, leaving the cool breeze from the Bay behind them and Ianto wondered what kind of a plan Jack had.

He frowned when Jack parked the car near the Capital Tower. His confusion didn’t alleviate when Jack took his hand gently and led him to the tall building. In the lobby, the captain produced a couple of passes from one of the pockets of his greatcoat. The security guard at the door let them through without a word.

They boarded one of the lifts and Jack pressed the button for the top floor.

‘Will you tell me where exactly we are going?,’ Ianto asked, when the lift door closed.

‘To the roof.’

Ianto couldn’t decide if that was a good thing and whether he wanted to punch Jack or kiss him.

So he did neither, but waited patiently for the lift to reach its destination, sensing Jack’s wandering gaze all over his body.

‘Why do I have a feeling you’re trying to undress me with your eyes?’

‘It may have something to do with the fact that I _am_ trying that,’ said Jack cockily.

The lift stopped and they went out into the top floor hallway. It was obvious from the way he went straight to the door leading onto the roof that Jack had been there many times before.

‘So what? You just go to a building to get on the roof?,’ Ianto asked.

‘Something like that.’

Jack let Ianto through the door first, following quickly behind to catch his expression as he took in the view.

It was marvellous. The sky was orange from the setting sun, giving the city an almost fairytale-like glow. Bute Park below was golden with its autumn-coloured trees. Everything – the Castle, the Millennium Stadium, Queen’s Arcade, the Hilton – looked somehow so much _better_ , so much more picturesque from up there. Ianto couldn’t tell what made the difference – the distance from the ground or the orange glare of the sun.

‘Well, that certainly is- something else,’ he said eventually.

Jack watched the wonder on the young man’s face and put his hands on Ianto’s shoulders. It seemed like seeing Cardiff from up high made a bigger impression on Ianto than the Hub with all its mysteries.

‘Just like you,’ he said softly.

Ianto gave him a dubious look, but Jack’s eyes were earnest.

‘Seriously? I wouldn’t peg you for a romantic.’

‘Why is that?’ He sounded indignant.

‘Technically speaking, we had sex before the first date. That’s hardly the definition of being romantic.’

Jack nodded with a chuckle, walking closer to the edge of the roof. The sun was blinding, but he didn’t mind. It was one of his favourite places in Cardiff. He loved looking down on the city, all those people oblivious to what existed right under their noses. It wasn’t that he looked at them with a sense of superiority; he felt envy. What wouldn’t he give to trade places with them. He wasn’t a hero, that was the Doctor’s place. He wished he could have a normal life, one that would end, one that could be filled with love that wouldn’t have to have an expiration date. He hated commitment, because he could never grow old with anyone. What was the point of being a couple if you didn’t even have the chance to do that?

Ianto followed him and leant on the short wall that circled the flat roof. Watching the sunset from the top of one of Cardiff’s tallest buildings was something he wouldn’t have expected Jack to come up with for a date. But it was a pleasant surprise. Even though they were only beginning to know each other and no promises had been made, the date made Ianto a little bit more hopeful about whatever it was that was happening between the two of them. He scolded himself internally for that. It was bound to be a mistake.

‘So-,’ he broke the companionable silence, ‘I take it you do this a lot? Watching sunsets from roofs?’

‘Sunsets, sunrises, depending on the company or lack of it.’

‘Any reason for that?’

‘I like the perspective,’ Jack said. ‘And sometimes you just need to get out of the dungeons.’

‘It didn’t seem like someone forces you to live in a bunker,’ Ianto pointed out.

To his surprise, he didn’t get an answer right away. Jack put his hands together, leaning forward next to Ianto and looking into the last rays of the sun. His thoughts wandered off to his far-off past in the Boeshane Peninsula, distracting him momentarily from the here and now.

‘Guess I’m sentimental,’ he said finally, looking back to his companion. ‘Where I come from, houses looked a lot like bunkers. And then, I kinda enjoyed the time I spent in the bunkers during the Blitz. It would often get interesting.’ He smirked and Ianto snorted; somehow Jack could go from sentimentality straight to sex.

‘So the view’s about sentiments, too?’

‘No,’ Jack told him. ‘It’s nothing like where I grew up. None of the streets and buildings, or people. It was much more deserted there.’

‘And you’re not gonna tell me where you came from? Apart from the century?’ Ianto turned, moving unknowingly closer to Jack. ‘You said I wouldn’t know where it was. Try me. I have a surprisingly vast knowledge for a coffee boy.’

‘Humans won’t reach that planet for a few more hundred years. I’m pretty sure you don’t know where it is.’

Ianto nodded, surrendering.

‘Okay. If you say so.’ He hesitated for a moment. ‘Why- Why are we doing this?’

‘This?’ Jack pointed to him and then to himself with a querying look. ‘I thought this was what two humans who were attracted to each other did, but I may be wrong.’

‘But it’s not that you ask every person who serves you coffee out?’

He honestly expected Jack to laugh it off. But instead he felt a hand on his and blue eyes were boring into his own.

‘No.’

‘I can work with that,’ Ianto managed to say. ‘But you should be warned, I’m not much good at casual.’

And even though that should’ve made him walk away, Jack put his hand on the back of Ianto’s neck and kissed him. More passionate than ever before.

***

Their second morning after was on a Saturday. Ianto woke up late, alone in his bed, the sheets soaked in Jack’s scent. He didn’t worry about the man’s absence in bed because he could hear him move about the kitchen. Ianto smiled to himself. There was a pleasant flutter in his stomach at the almost domestic feeling of the morning.

He rolled out of bed, dragging the sheet after him and wrapping it around his body. He trudged to the kitchen, following the noises.

It wasn’t much of a surprise to see Jack naked, fiddling with the toaster.

‘Morning,’ Ianto said from the door, earning one of Jack’s dazzling grins.

‘Toast? I thought I’d leave the coffee-making to you.’

‘Yeah, cheers.’

He barely finished the sentence and Jack was already pulling him in for a good morning kiss. Except that it didn’t end on just one kiss, and only the smell of burned bread reminded them that it was time for breakfast, and not another kind of protein boost.

It was so easy. So simple. Getting up in the morning on a day off to see the person you spent the night with in the kitchen, making breakfast. And it didn’t make any difference that they still barely knew each other, or that Jack was a man, or that he was an immortal from the future who was running a secret organisation and hunting aliens. It was just the sweet, intoxicating feeling of falling gradually, deeply in love.

And it felt so _right_.

It was difficult to tell if Jack was feeling the same, but when his phone beeped suddenly just as they were finishing their breakfast (talking about going straight back to bed once they were done), he didn’t look happy. He winced at the screen and Ianto caught himself thinking that it probably wasn’t just the disappointment from missing morning sex.

‘I gotta go,’ Jack said, standing to his feet abruptly. ‘There was a spike in Rift activity and I have to- You know. Hunt aliens.’

‘I get it. Just go.’ He tried not to show how much he regretted Jack’s leaving. But he also couldn’t help but watch him walk back to where they’d dropped their clothes in the hallway the night before.

Jack noticed him staring and smiled mischievously, as he pulled on his trousers and shirt, and slapped on his braces.

‘If you’re still free tonight, maybe we could- dabble some more?,’ he said.

‘Sure.’

‘Glad to hear that.’

Jack kissed Ianto on the mouth one more time and left.

***

‘Where were you anyway?,’ Gwen asked Jack after they’d carefully examined the piece of technology the team had retrieved that morning. It was a circular object, looking a lot like it was made of steel, except that Tosh had already established it wasn’t made of any terrestrial metal. She was still working on figuring out what was its purpose, but for now, there wasn’t much more for them to be doing.

‘Out.’

Jack didn’t feel the need to explain himself. This whole thing felt like a weakness anyway. A good, bloody amazing kind of weakness, but a weakness nonetheless.

‘He was shagging that coffee boy, obviously,’ Owen cut in. ‘Why are you even asking?’

‘No reason.’

Jack only rolled his eyes, and went back to his office. It was one of those moments when he hated working in such a small group; everyone was putting their nose into the others’ business and he really didn’t want to have them question his actions when it came to Ianto. Especially when he kept on questioning them himself every single second.

He’d only been sitting down for a minute when a knock came from the door. He looked up to see Tosh smiling shyly at him.

‘May I?’

‘Come on in, Tosh. What’s up? Something new about the tech already?’

She shook her head slightly.

‘No, it’s not about that.’ Toshiko walked up to his desk uncertainly. That was enough for Jack to know what she wanted to talk about.

‘Not you too,’ he groaned.

‘No, no, it’s not like that,’ she said defensively. ‘I just wanted to say that I’m happy for you. I wish I had this sort of luck, but I’m glad you found someone. We all need somebody outside of this mess.’

He smiled, more to himself than to Tosh. Maybe she was right. Maybe _he_ was right in doing this. He deserved something good and lasting in his life, didn’t he? Maybe it would last? Not forever, obviously, that was impossible, but a while? Ianto was young, they could have years together, decades even.

Maybe it wasn’t all so hopeless after all.

‘I guess we do,’ he told Toshiko.

***

They kept on surprising each other. Jack waiting for Ianto outside of the café at the end of his shift – even though he kept on visiting the coffee shop regularly during Ianto’s working hours – or knocking on his door in the morning. Ianto appearing randomly by the Water Tower late in the evening. Taking each other out to restaurants or movies. Or to look down on the city from tall buildings.

It was perfect. Whatever _it_ was.

They were gradually learning things about each other that went beyond names, professions or turn-ons. Ianto was trying to explore the intricacies of Jack’s complex personality, happy at every glimpse of something new. In turn, Jack was discovering more and more little somethings about Ianto, his guilty pleasures and pet peeves. It was all so simple, accompanied by meals in town, late night talks and long streaks of silence. And hours spent on memorising each other’s body, inch by inch.

But neither of them went so far as to say what it really was between them.

It felt like they were a couple. Spending all the free time they could get together, bickering about what pizza they were going to order for a night in, teasing each other about the weight they could gain from the unhealthy food. Slipping their hands almost unknowingly into a gentle grasp from time to time. Waking up next to each other in the mornings.

Almost three weeks had passed in this quiet contentment before Ianto gained enough courage to ask Jack about it.

They were walking back to Roald Dahl Plass after a fancy (candlelit even) dinner at a French restaurant, their fingers interwoven, their shoulders brushing against each other.

‘Jack?,’ Ianto began uncertainly.

‘Hm?’

‘What is this thing- with us? Can I even be talking about any _us_?’

Jack didn’t answer immediately, but his hand automatically locked tighter over Ianto’s.

That was a question he’d been pushing to the back of his mind for as long as _this thing_ was going on. Were they a thing? A couple? Boyfriends? Lovers? He liked the sound of each of those, but hated what the outcome of each and every single one of them could be. Heartbreak, heartbreak, and some more heartbreak.

And he didn’t even mean his own heartbreak.

He was quite certain that, despite his best intentions, Ianto would end up getting hurt by him and he hated to think that.

‘Sure, there’s us,’ he said finally, managing a quick, almost playful look at Ianto. ‘There’s me and there’s you, that’s what us means.’

‘I meant if this- if there’s us- like the couple sort of _us_.’

‘Do you want there to be?,’ Jack asked, turning his eyes away.

This was the conversation he’d been hoping to avoid, from the very beginning. He wished he could just keep this unlabeled, as casual as it could be, despite the feelings that kept on developing and growing inside him. Despite the feelings that he could tell Ianto had for him.

‘As much as I’m not fond of labels, I wish I knew what you were to me. If I had to introduce you to someone,’ Ianto replied carefully.

They hardly even noticed when they stopped and unlinked their hands.

‘Someone? Family someone, or just- someone?’

‘I’ll take it as you saying you don’t want to meet my family.’

Jack sighed with resignation. He could hear the hurt in Ianto’s voice, the attempt to hide it proving futile.

‘It’s a little complicated. Meeting families with the- condition that I have. You see, at some point, they’d start noticing I don’t grow old. It’s not nice hearing botox jokes, you know.’

Ianto snorted out a laugh in spite of himself, before forcing himself to return to the not-so-pleasant conversation.

‘I just need to know if this is going anywhere. If this is a- a relationship. Or if this is just shagging.’

Stepping in front of Ianto, Jack put his hands on the sides of the other man’s face. No looking away this time. Ianto wanted a serious answer? He was going to get it.

‘You know I’m not really a settle-down-and-grow-old-together kinda guy, right? I _can’t_ be. But if you’re asking if you are my first thought in the morning and my last thought at night, whether you’re sleeping next to me or not, then the answer is yes. I can’t guarantee I’ll still be here in ten years’ time, but I want to be here _now_ and in the foreseeable future.’

They stared at each other intently for another moment, wordlessly, but still managing to continue the conversation. Finally, Ianto broke the eye contact to kiss Jack softly on the lips.

‘Thank you,’ he said as he pulled away.

‘You’re welcome.’

Smiling contentedly at each other, they intertwined their fingers again and resumed walking.

‘Is boyfriend a good enough title for you?,’ Ianto asked after a moment’s silence.

‘As long as I’m _your_ boyfriend.’

***

So boyfriends they were.

The Torchwood team would tease Jack about him settling down, but deep down they were happy for him. Ianto went out with them for drinks a couple of times, and Gwen, Owen and Tosh had to admit he was a cool bloke. His rational treatment of their job was another thing that bought him into their graces.

Only that during the month that had passed since Ianto’s first visit to the Hub, the closest he got to an alien was when he was helping Jack clean himself up after an unpleasant encounter with something that puked disgusting yellowish goo. Jack wouldn’t mention his job very often, either. He’d rather keep Ianto as much in the normal world as he could; there was a part of him that wished he could have the sort of relationship that Gwen had with Rhys – honest, but human, normal.

Ianto didn’t mind that very much. Sure, he was curious about all the extraterrestrial stuff he’d pass on his way to Jack’s bunker or about the creatures Torchwood would chase around Cardiff on a regular basis. But as long as Jack didn’t lie to him, he could deal with his leaving work at work.

Just above a week after drawing the conclusion that they were boyfriends, they were walking back from having a dinner out to the Torchwood SUV which they’d left near Cathays Park. It was a quiet, cold evening, but they took their time, enjoying every second of their evening together.

Until something rustled in the shrubbery somewhere to their right. Jack’s hand instinctively dropped Ianto’s and reached to the holster at his hip, stopping in his tracks.

Ianto could tell that suddenly the situation got serious. He felt Jack’s body tensed next to him, the captain immediately focused on the sound coming from the dark patch of bushes. That must have been what he was like at work, Ianto thought. It was scary, but at the same time, it was marvellous. Breathtaking.

Another second later, his attention was pulled away from his boyfriend and to the creature that darted out from the dark. At first he thought it was a quite ugly, disfigured human. Then, he caught a glimpse of his beast-like snout in the glare of a distant streetlamp and realised it was not a man. And, judging by Jack jerking his Webley revolver out of its holster, he decided it must have been alien. A hunched, humanoid alien with long sharp teeth that looked much like a bear’s. Ianto took a step back in a mixture of surprise and horror.

‘Jack? What is that?,’ he asked in a whisper.

‘A Weevil,’ Jack said, without looking back.

‘So it’s an alien?’

‘Yup.’

‘But you can handle it, can’t you?’

Jack glanced at him with a torn expression.

‘I should probably tell you that I left the paralytics in the SUV.’ He let out a nervous chuckle. ‘Sorry.’

Ianto couldn’t help but roll his eyes.

‘And you want to save the world with a ninety-year-old gun.’

‘Hey! It’s a classic!,’ Jack told him indignantly.

‘Jack, look out!’

While the captain’s attention was focused on Ianto, the Weevil noticed them, and after a moment’s hesitation, it started running towards them with an animalistic growl. For whatever reason, it found them to be a threat and was now charging at them.

Jack took aim and fired. The bullet grazed the Weevil’s arm, causing it to howl in pain and speed up its attack. Ianto ducked behind Jack, trusting the captain would protect him, well trained and accustomed in facing alien creatures.

But what Ianto couldn’t have taken into consideration was that Jack wasn’t used to protecting people that he was involved with from stray Weevils in Cathays Park. Taken by surprise, without the paralytics at hand, and with Ianto a step behind him, for a second he panicked. He aimed the Webley again, but missed, the bullet flying past the Weevil way too far to its right.

‘Damn it,’ Jack muttered angrily under his breath. He turned his head to Ianto, clearly terrified. ‘Ianto, run.’

‘I’m not going anywhere.’

Instead of following Jack’s order, he looked at the ground near them, grabbed a thick fallen branch, and held it up like a baseball bat.

The Weevil was just a few feet from them when it stopped abruptly, growling. Jack pulled the trigger for the third time, and the bullet lodged itself in the upper right side of the creature’s chest. It only made the alien growl louder and jump to the side, avoiding the barrel of Jack’s revolver by mere inches.

But it didn’t avoid Ianto’s improvised bat, which made the creature jump backwards. For a second Ianto thought the danger was behind them and the Weevil had been knocked out.

His error was clear very soon, when the enraged hurt alien charged at him, teeth bared, a guttural noise coming from behind its lips. Ianto screamed when the Weevil’s sharp canines sank into the crook between his neck and his shoulder. Warm sticky blood streamed down his chest as he tumbled to the ground.

‘Ianto! NO!,’ were the last words he heard before darkness overwhelmed him.

***

He woke up to a tugging sensation in his shoulder. He groaned, opening his eyes. The room was almost completely dark, save for a yellow glow from the corridor. Even if he didn’t remember the events from earlier, he could guess he was in a hospital. The plain white walls and the chemical smell in his nose gave it away.

It took him a minute to realise he wasn’t alone in the room.

In the shadow by his bed, Jack was sitting, his elbows propped on his knees, face in his hands. Ianto thought it looked a bit like the captain had been crying. But he knew that was impossible.

‘Jack?,’ Ianto whispered.

The man stirred, and his hands fell down to one of Ianto’s placed on top of his covers. There was relief painted clearly on his face.

‘Ianto. How are you feeling?’ He didn’t smile. Not a twitch of muscle.

‘Like I was mauled by a savage alien,’ Ianto quipped despite the pain.

‘I can call a doctor to give you some more painkillers.’

Ianto shook his head, before realising how bad an idea it was with stitches in his neck.

‘Thanks, but no. I’m fine,’ he said, watching as Jack dropped his head, staring at their joined hands on the bed. ‘But I guess you can’t say the same. Jack- it’s not your fault.’

‘It is.’ Ianto tried to protest, but Jack continued. ‘I knew this could happen. I should have never even started this thing. I should’ve known by now that whenever I get close to someone, they get hurt. One way or another. People around me always get hurt.’

His voice dropped. He hated having to do this, but it had to be done. There was nothing that would make him hate himself more than knowing he was responsible for Ianto’s death. He had to do whatever was in his power not to lead to it.

Ianto pulled himself up to a sitting position on the bed, boring his gaze into Jack’s face, but Jack still refused to look up.

‘Jack, I knew what you do for a living when we started this. I know what I’m getting myself into. You’re immortal, I’m not. You hunt aliens, I make coffee for a living, and I’ve never been in a fight or had a gun in my hands. I know this relationship, or whatever, is doomed. I know about the Rift. I know a Weevil or something else can jump from around a corner and attack me. With you, at least I have a better chance of survival. You didn’t bring the Weevils to Cardiff, the Rift did. Don’t blame yourself.’

For a moment he felt silly for the speech he gave. He didn’t normally talk this much, especially not when it came to feelings and serious stuff.

But he expected Jack to lift his eyes at him, send him that dazzling smile and agree with him.

He didn’t think Jack would untangle his hands from Ianto’s and reach to the table for a paper cup that had until then slipped Ianto’s notice.

‘Here, drink this. You must be thirsty.’

Ianto took the cup without a second thought. He could feel a tingly dryness in the back of his throat, in that Jack was right. He took a long sip of the water. There was a subtle hint of something other than water in it, but he dismissed it for a second.

Until he remembered that one conversation in the Hub so long ago.

‘Retcon,’ he mumbled. ‘You gave me Retcon, Jack!’

Jack finally looked up at him, trying to smile and failing.

‘It’s for the best, Ianto.’

‘But- it’s-‘

He didn’t manage to finish the sentence. The mix of Retcon and painkillers knocked him out in seconds. Jack watched him slump back onto the pillow, his heart breaking over all the choices he’d made about that pretty boy with a twinkle in his eye. He hated himself for making Ianto fall for him. This was for the best, it was.

He leant over Ianto’s sleeping form and kissed him on the forehead, before slipping out of the room.

***

Later that night, Jack was watching his team working on covering up the death of a young girl who was so unfortunate as to cross paths with the Weevil without the benefit of being armed or otherwise prepared for an encounter with an alien equipped with a deadly set of teeth.

At least he could comfort himself with the thought that it wasn’t an innocent creature he packed full of lead.

Having to deal with that on top of the ache of letting Ianto go could have just about overwhelmed him.

***

The first sensation that Ianto became aware of when he woke up early the next morning, was an immense pounding in his head. Then came the pain in his neck.

And then the realisation that he couldn’t remember how he ended up in hospital.

Or anything much from the last few weeks.

It took him about six seconds – despite the massive headache and general lack of well-being – to remember that trauma could cause short-term memory loss, and that whatever painkillers he must have been given for whatever happened to his neck, he had already metabolised them.

It took him the whole of the next hour to figure out that his amnesia went well beyond what caused his injuries. He searched his mind for any details of the last month or so. Goings-on at work, visits at Rhiannon’s, social calls, watched films and take-out pizza. He came up blank, except for some vague recollections of the normal rhythm of his life. Boring work, annoying customers, even more annoying co-workers, home and telly in the evenings. He couldn’t give a single example of a particular situation that irritated him at work, though, or of a film that he caught after clocking off.

It felt as if everything was there, but shrouded by a thick impenetrable fog.

Finally, he gave in and rang for a nurse to give him some painkillers and – more importantly – information.

So as soon as the drugs were in his system, he asked the petite dark-haired girl who gave them to him about the wounds in his neck.

‘You were bitten by a stray dog, don’t you remember?,’ she said with a pitying and slightly condescending look.

‘No, nothing. A dog?’ He frowned. ‘How did I get here?’

‘A man brought you in. I think you were unconscious from the blood loss.’

Ianto’s frown deepened. What man? What bloody dog? Did he get attacked by some rabid animal on his way from work? How in hell could something like this happen? How could his memories go up and away?

What had he been doing for the last few weeks? Was it the trauma that made him forget? What else could it be? Was it something that happened within the time that made his mind blank?

He smiled eventually at the nurse, acting as if everything was fine.

‘Who was the man who brought me in? I’d like to thank him, if that’s possible?’

‘We don’t have his details,’ the nurse said. ‘But we thought he was his boyfriend? He gave the impression...’

Ianto knitted his eyebrows again in confusion. Boyfriend? Since when did he have boyfriends at all? He had never even kissed another man, not to mention being in a relationship with one. Or maybe it was just another thing he didn’t remember.

‘No, I’m not- I don’t have a boyfriend,’ he said after a moment of pensiveness.

The nurse thought his brain was sluggish after the drugs. Truth was, his brain was working at double speed, trying to dispel the fog that clouded his memories and make sense of whatever was happening. To not much avail.

He was left alone in his room and with his thoughts. If he concentrated hard enough, he could recall a faint outline of a man in a long coat in the door of the café. And Cardiff Bay at night. And the Water Tower in the middle of Roald Dahl Plass.

Only why would he be thinking of things he’d known for years when trying to recall the last month? And who was the man he couldn’t quite match a name to?

As much as he tried, he couldn’t find answers.

***

Ianto was released from hospital after the morning rounds, armed with prescription painkillers. He caught a cab back home and propped his throbbing head on the cool glass of the car window, closing his eyes. If not for the cabby’s restless driving, he would’ve dozed off on the way to his flat.

Finally he scrambled out of the car in front of his building, rubbing his face to push the sleepiness away. He felt like crap. All he could think about was his own bed, some more sleep and some more painkillers. He didn’t look back or around the street, but shuffled his feet to the door.

He didn’t notice the black SUV with tinted windows which was standing on the opposite side of the road. From inside it, a handsome man in a military greatcoat was watching Ianto’s every move. His expression was caught somewhere in between relief and heartbreak.

Once in the flat, Ianto shrugged off his coat and suit jacket, and removed his tie to dump them in his bedroom (he was too damn exhausted to be bothered by the mess). It took him a second to notice there was something wrong about his bedroom, as he stopped in the doorway. Why would he have left the sheets so ruffled? The bed looked like someone had just been using it for far more recreational purposes than sleep. And they seemed to have had a lot of fun. Ianto frowned at the scattered wrappings and used condoms. Crumpled tissues and half-used-up lube.

The only word that seemed to be ringing in his ears was _boyfriend_.

Could he really have forgotten about someone as important as a boyfriend? It didn’t even matter he had never had a boyfriend before. He simply wasn’t one to take these things lightly.

He yanked his mobile from out of his trouser pocket. Strangely, no calls were recorded, except from the one from early this morning when he had phoned his boss to explain his health situation. No text messages either. This was getting weirder by the second. He flipped through the photos from the phone’s camera; nothing from the last five weeks. And he was pretty sure that if he was dating anyone, there would be _some_ proof.

He scrolled through his contacts. Nothing out of the ordinary. No unknown names.

Whatever happened to him, someone had to have got hold of his mobile and wiped all evidence of _somebody’s_ existence.

Only whose?

***

When Jack finally showed up at the Hub, he was unnaturally quiet. The others only eyed him from a distance, exchanging glances between one another. Owen seemed like he wanted to tell Jack something, but Gwen and Tosh mimed to him to keep his mouth shut, in a way that suggested there would’ve been swearwords involved if they were speaking.

At first, they thought Jack would take a couple of hours of solitude and re-emerge from his office with his regular grin and energy. But they soon realised they couldn’t have been more wrong. When he finally did come out into the main area of the Hub, he was still sad and melancholic, and he escaped back into his office as soon as he was reassured nothing had been happening in the time he was busy elsewhere. He didn’t mention Ianto, not now, not earlier, but the team had known from the beginning Jack’s behaviour had everything to do with the coffee boy.

Once the end of regular Torchwood office hours came and no unusual Rift activity was spotted or predicted, Gwen, Owen and Tosh tried to convince Jack to join them for drinks, which he refused without providing a reason. He wouldn’t admit to them the memory of the last time they went out together was too vivid and too painful for him to bear that night, because then, Ianto was with them. He could still feel Ianto’s hand where he had placed it timidly on Jack’s knee under the table, and he remembered how they snuck out to the bathroom and Ianto gave him head (and he was absolutely marvellous), and how Jack put his arm around Ianto’s shoulders when they were back sitting at the booth with the others. And that one time, when after a few drinks Ianto overcame his need for privacy enough to give him a peck on the lips in front of everyone.

So the three left together. They hardly spoke until halfway through Owen’s second lager. He downed the first bottle unusually fast, even for him, which worried the women and prompted them to pick up the topic they knew all of them were being eaten by.

‘What do you think happened with Ianto?,’ Gwen asked finally.

Tosh shrugged and took a sip of her wine.

‘It’s hard to tell. We can’t honestly count on Jack to just open up.’

‘Maybe he was tired of Jack’s shit,’ Owen said, feigning indifference.

‘Aren’t we all sometimes,’ Gwen muttered. ‘But I don’t think it’s that. Something happened. Something serious.’

The other two stayed silent for a moment, Owen temporarily distracted by a girl with a pair of impressive breasts, and Tosh gave him a longing look while his eyes were turned away from her.

‘Yeah, maybe,’ Toshiko agreed at last, dropping her gaze to her glass as soon as Owen turned his attention back to his friends. ‘But what could it be? Ianto knows about what we do, so what would have to happen for Jack to end it?’

‘I reckon if Ianto was in danger-,’ Gwen’s voice trailed off. ‘If him knowing about Torchwood put him in danger-‘

‘Jack would Retcon him,’ Tosh stated.

‘And thus the captain sulk’s been explained,’ Owen summed up.

And somehow, the three of them didn’t feel very cheerful that night, either.

***

Ianto spent most of the day fighting with pain. His efforts were largely futile with the damned persistent headache and the acute awareness of the stitches in his neck. He tried to be grateful that whatever attacked him missed his carotid artery, but the aches made the task difficult.

At one point, he peeled the corner of the dressing off to see the wound beneath. It certainly did look like an impression made by a set of jaws, but he could hardly imagine any dog with teeth like that. Unless it was some kind of highly mutated Rottweiler or something. And a huge one at that. The marks looked more as if they were left by a grizzly bear, though Ianto couldn’t possibly imagine one of those running loose around Cardiff. And he certainly would have remembered if a wild animal had escaped from the zoo. Which it didn’t; Ianto checked just to be sure. There had been no break out from the zoo in years.

He still wasn’t getting any answers. His memories were still vague, no matter how hard he concentrated. Just the strange sense that the outline of a guy in a long coat, the Water Tower and Mermaid Quay at night were somehow connected. But how? He couldn’t make that out.

Eventually, exhausted by the pain and his failure in remembering the last weeks, he fell asleep.

His sleep was restless. There were images in his dreams that seemed familiar and strange at the same time, and as soon as he would wake up, they were gone. It felt as if they were retreating to their place among the shadows that were hiding his memories. By the time he woke up the fourth time, he was sure his subconscious was trying to help him remember, but for whatever reason, it couldn’t succeed.

That was also when Ianto gave up on sleeping any more that night. It was almost four in the morning, and he decided both sleep and wakefulness were shit at that point. So he got out of bed and put on some clothes, popping a couple more painkillers as he went.

Ianto was pretty sure this was pointless, but he couldn’t sleep with the frustrating dreams recurring over and over and he decided he could use some fresh air. He didn’t initially think he’d walk all the way to Roald Dahl Plass; his feet seemed to have picked the direction of their own accord and didn’t waver in their decision until he was stood on the edge of the vast plaza.

This felt weirdly familiar; as if he’d done this before. Of course, he couldn’t tell with certainly there was a situation like that. He sighed, resigned. He was probably going crazy. The drugs weren’t the best idea, either, taking that into account. Maybe they were causing him to hallucinate?

But then, what caused his amnesia?

He shook his head to himself and started towards the Water Tower.

***

Jack couldn’t remember the last time he’d wished as badly for alcohol to have any effect on him. He’d been pouring insane amounts of scotch down his throat all night, yet he was as sober as if he was drinking water. He sighed, wishing anything could help him dispel his terrible mood, and he got up from his desk to glance at the monitors in the main working area of the Hub. Maybe at least work could get his mind off this stupid love story he got himself caught in. Although he doubted any amount of aliens could help his thoughts from wandering off to how much he wished he had Ianto by his side. Now and forever.

He examined the Rift readings thrice as thoroughly as he usually did, even though they were perfectly normal. He checked if his team mates had turned in all the reports that were due, even though he never cared much for those, no matter how useful they could turn out to be some day. There was nothing more to be done. Except maybe from picking up the rubbish strewn throughout the base, but that made Jack’s thoughts turn back to the topic he most wanted to avoid, so he decided to take a look at the CCTV of the Plass, in case a Weevil came out of the sewers and into Torchwood’s neighbourhood.

But what he saw was definitely not a Weevil.

His breath caught in his throat. There, in the open space of the plaza, walking up to the Water Tower, unmistakeably, was Ianto. Jack knew the movements and the silhouette, he’d know them anywhere. Except, how...? He wasn’t supposed to be there! That was the whole point of Retcon, you were supposed to forget the significance of this place, forget about the invisible lift and the clandestine organisation hiding in the guts of Cardiff right next to the Bay.

Obviously, there was Gwen overcoming the pill’s effects, but that was only because of what she saw and what she heard from Suzie. It was a strong stimulus that beat the Retcon. Idris Hopper was simply immune, that was different story altogether. Was Ianto immune, too? Or did something happen that made him remember? Or maybe it was a coincidence that he was there at all?

Jack snorted at the thought. No, that couldn’t be a coincidence. It wasn’t even five a.m. What could a normal person be not only doing up, but wandering around Roald Dahl Plass at that time of night? Especially if they had been released from hospital the morning before.

Without thinking, Jack grabbed his coat in a rush and stepped on the invisible lift, switching the hydraulic system on with his wrist strap.

He’d stay on the pavement slab, hidden from Ianto’s sight by the perception filter. He’d just look, make sure Ianto’s okay. He wouldn’t say a word, he wouldn’t let him know he was there.

But, god, he missed him. He’d let him go not thirty hours ago, and he already felt like a huge chunk of himself had been chopped off. And having Ianto so close made him feel just the tiniest bit more complete again.

By the time the lift arrived at the Plass, Ianto had walked almost all the way up to the Water Tower and he was staring at it with an unreadable expression. He was frowning, as if he was working hard on figuring out a puzzle. The Retcon _was_ working, only not as well as it was supposed to.

They stayed like that for a few minutes; Jack watching Ianto, and Ianto watching the tower without being able to notice Jack. What he did feel though, was the weighing sensation of being observed. So Ianto looked quickly around the plaza, expecting to see someone behind him or to the side, but there was no one.

The perception filter surrounding the invisible lift made it impossible for Ianto to see Jack, but not to _feel_ him.

Having made sure he was imagining being watched, Ianto made his way slowly towards the Water Tower. What was it about that thing that drew him here? He wanted to get as close as he could to it, thinking inanely that it would clear something up. _Anything_. He just needed answers, and he was willing to do the stupidest things imaginable if there was the slimmest chance of getting them. And somehow, deep down he felt it all _did_ in the end make sense.

Jack froze, seeing that Ianto was approaching the Water Tower. He could still get the lift to work, but he wasn’t sure it would close in time. Gwen had a point when she had said people could fall into the gap the lift left for a moment every time it was working. In any case, Jack didn’t know for sure that Ianto would walk up right to the tower until it was too late to do anything.

Ianto was only a couple of feet away from the tower when something – someone – appeared in his peripheral vision, pulling his attention away from the structure itself, his fingers beginning to reach to its smooth shiny surface.

What he first noticed about the figure, apart from the fact that the person seemed to have come from nowhere, was that it was familiar. Vaguely familiar with the long coat. Then he examined the man’s face in the poor artificial light of the street lamps.

It felt as if all the cogwheels in his brain were beginning to stir into place.

‘Jack,’ he choked out, surprised he knew the name, but as soon as he said it, he knew it was the name of the man in front of him.

Captain Jack Harkness. His customer at the café who came every day, waiting for aliens to appear. Because he ran a secret organisation which hunted aliens here in Cardiff. Torchwood they were called. Torchwood Three. Because Cardiff was situated on a Rift in time and space, and things and creatures sometimes came through, so someone had to clean up the mess. And Ianto had followed Jack to the plaza to find out more about him, which he did, and they ended up having sex in the Torchwood Hub below Roald Dahl Plass. And that had been just the beginning.

Because Jack _was_ his boyfriend.

Suddenly, everything came rushing back to the surface, the thick fog dispersing in Ianto’s mind.

‘Jack,’ he breathed again. ‘It wasn’t for the best.’

For a second, Jack wasn’t sure what to do. His plan to put Ianto back into a normal life failed, but that only forced him to admit that he’d wanted it to fail all along.

‘Do you know what it feels like to have a huge gap in your memory?,’ Ianto asked, accusatorily. ‘I thought I was going crazy! Again! And I don’t appreciate the feeling.’

Without speaking, but with an enormous wave of guilt overcoming him – because he did know how it felt not remembering a chunk of his life – Jack pulled Ianto into an embrace, so strong it felt like he would never let him go.

‘I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,’ he muttered finally into Ianto’s ear. ‘I just wanted to keep you safe.’

Ianto pulled away to look into Jack’s eyes.

‘But I felt safe. I _feel_ safe with you. And don’t you get it? This is _my_ choice. I chose to stay, even though you’ve given me ample reasons to run. Don’t you ever take that choice away from me again.’

‘I won’t,’ Jack said somewhat unwillingly. ‘Though I would feel better if you could protect yourself with something more dangerous than fallen branches. Something more metal. Like a gun.’

Ianto chuckled and slipped his hand in Jack’s, squeezing it lightly.

‘That’s probably a good idea.’ He paused, an idea brewing in his freshly recovered mind. ‘Hey, you don’t happen to have a vacancy at Torchwood, do you?’

***

Ianto made that decision within seconds, but once he did, he was determined to see it happen. At first, it seemed to him that Jack should be delighted with the opportunity to work with Ianto and to have an eye on him at all times. As it soon turned out, though, the perspective horrified him. That was exactly what he’d always wanted to keep Ianto reasonably away from. As far away as that was possible in such a close proximity to the Rift.

What Jack in turn learnt very soon, was that Ianto’s mind was very difficult to change once it was made up.

‘You wanted me to be better prepared to protect myself. To have a gun. I could have a gun at Torchwood!,’ Ianto reasoned for the hundredth time a few days after his initial idea.

‘But I was talking hypothetically,’ Jack said. ‘I never wanted you to have to use it, and at Torchwood, you would most definitely have to.’

‘So?’ Ianto shrugged.

‘So I don’t want to put you in danger.’

Jack could barely hold back a smile at the adorable pout his boyfriend made at him.

‘Fine, I’m not leaving my flat from now on. ‘Cause, you know, a car could hit me in the street.’ The sarcasm in Ianto’s voice was a clear sign he wasn’t letting the matter go.

‘That’s different and you know it.’ Jack watched as Ianto crossed his arms stubbornly over his chest. There was no winning this battle. ‘Okay, let’s say I _would_ agree on you working for Torchwood.’

Within split seconds, Ianto’s face brightened and he moved to the edge of the armchair he was sitting in.

‘Yeah? You would? What’s the “but”?’

‘Not the butt you’d want,’ Jack said cheekily and flashed him his trademark smile, and Ianto rolled his eyes at him. ‘I have a couple of conditions.’

Ianto sighed; he’d known there were bound to be some of those.

‘Go on.’

Jack held up one finger.

‘No field work until I say so.’ Ianto nodded reluctantly. ‘I’ll train you myself.’

‘I have a feeling with someone like you in charge of my training, it’s going to take an awfully long time,’ Ianto muttered.

‘Hey!,’ Jack said indignantly. He held up another digit. ‘You’re going to do research. With that brilliant brain of yours, you could actually be an asset.’

‘Fine. I’m good at research.’ So far, Ianto didn’t have much problem with the conditions. They were all sensible and logical. Not to mention that he was quite sure he would find research work enjoyable.

‘And finally,’ Jack held up one more finger. ‘From now on, you’ll be in charge of the coffee. Because no one can stand the crap that Owen makes.’

Ianto faked a groan. ‘I thought I was leaving that part of my life behind!’

‘I thought you liked it!’

A crooked smile arched Ianto’s lips.

‘I do. I just wanted to make you feel bad for a moment.’ He paused, considering something. ‘Now I have a condition.’

Jack quirked a eyebrow in question.

‘When we’re at work, we’re at work,’ Ianto said. ‘You wanted a boyfriend outside of the alien shit? You’ll have one. No snogging, no hand-holding, no _shagging_ during office hours.’

He could tell Jack wasn’t very happy about it, but at the same time, the captain clearly saw that Ianto’s condition wasn’t unreasonable.

‘Can I at least count on you holding my hand in case I die?,’ he asked, his eyes caught somewhere in between pleading and flirtatious.

‘Fine, but only then.’

Jack beamed at him, and held out his hand towards him.

‘Okay then, Mr Jones, I believe we have a deal.’ Ianto shook his hand officiously. ‘Welcome aboard.’

Before letting Jack’s hand go, Ianto stopped, knitting his eyebrows.

‘That’s great, but- as to my condition... Do you think maybe it could start being valid after my training’s done?’

***

Ianto resigned from work at the café the next day. He did so without any doubts about his decision and with hardly any sentiments about the place. As he was leaving it for the last time, he smiled to himself, remembering the first time he handed a cup of coffee to the handsome man in an RAF greatcoat. Spending a good couple of years in that job was worth it because of that moment that led to what was happening in his life now.

And it had the potential of being great.

With every passing day he grew surer of that. As much as Jack was carefully avoiding any declarations of affection, Ianto was quite certain he knew the captain reciprocated his feelings. Why else would he go to such lengths to ensure Ianto’s safety? And Ianto could feel the warmth of Jack’s gaze on him whenever he wasn’t looking. And he could tell it wasn’t simply lust.

The training Jack designed for Ianto focused mainly on teaching him to shoot and fight. Just in case, as Captain Harkness stated several times a session.

Predictably, though, those training sessions – which took place in the privacy of the Torchwood shooting range – more frequently than not, ended in things far from combat or hostility. Sometimes, if Ianto’s common sense prevented them from losing all their clothes, they managed to go back to work.

‘You’re a fast learner,’ told him Jack on one of such evenings. ‘I love that about you.’

Ianto tried to suppress a smile, but a corner of his mouth pulled up anyway.

‘You’re a good teacher,’ he replied finally. ‘And I love that about you.’

They didn’t need to say anything else. They both understood.


End file.
